Sound System for Church

Hi,

we are looking for a proper sound system for our church. our church is 30 mt. long , 12 mt wide and 15 mt tall having a congregation of 500-600 people. Thank you for your valuable suggestions.

~M

Hi.It all depends what you want to do with this system.Is it just for speeches,or both music and speeches??
500 or 600 people is a lot.
How much money do you want to spend on this?

It would probably work best for multiple speakers setup all over the hall for better coverage.My advice is powered speakers.
MIKIMIKI

What is your budget?

Call Frank @ Audioworks Ct

For worship application I'd suggest a pair of Bose L1 Compact or the newer 1S or one classic L1 or the newer model 2.

Well,how many L1 do you need for 500-600 people?

For church, probably only ONE.
DonM

Our budget is around $10,000 which includes mixer, amp & speakers or powered speakers. We have choir of around 35 members, looking for a mixer with atleast 24 channels. Can you also suggest a mixer too?

Give me a call, and I can help design a system for your budget and your particular use and needs


(203) 876-1133

I would not get Bose.
This is probably going to be fixed instalation.
First I would get a digital mixer. Presonus StudioLive 24.4, or new Behringer x32.For speakers there is a lot of choice.
Try Jbl prx600 series.I just got prx635 3way and they are great.1500w powered.Those I would put for FOH.
The rest I would go with Jbl Prx612.Maybe 4 of those to install in the hall.Plus maybe two more for monitors.
Or for monitors you can get couple of Mackies too.
Also check these new Mackies that are coming out DLM.

Don't buy anything before you try all of them.10 000$ is a lot of money.
Make sure you get good mixer.And for the money digital is the way to go.
I would get x32.It is Behringer,but Midas made it.It has everything you need for processing.
Again don't buy anything before you try it first.Maybe at your church.
Mikimiki

Thank you all for your time and valuable suggestions...

All good advice, but I might consider that possibly, if you don't have a very technical soundman, maybe the digital boards are a bit overkill and confusing..?

Something simple, with one knob per function might be able to be worked by a wider variety of available helpers?

Diki is offering some good advice, I'd listen.

I agree Diki.But, now days all digital board have presets.It is great starting point.They will have lots of mics and digital mixer has everythingbthey need for vocals.Eq,compresor,gate,efx and more..
Presonus Studio Live is easy to use.Almost like analog mixer.Once they go digital mixer,they will never go back to analog..

Give Electro-Voice a look. They are tops and are super clear. I know Peavey also makes a "Sanctuary Series" for church applications but I haven't given it a look.

Well the Bose L1 ( or 2 for stereo ) may well be the easiest sytem to get up and sounding good in a room without a lot of technical knowledge. Plus its sound quality would be best suited to a church. It's not like you need a system with a lot of punch in that situation, but simply one that fills the room well without being overbearing. And is much less susceptible to feedback problems than a conventional system which makes it ideal for both speech and music.

The most fantastic church system I've seen was made by Bose. I saw and heard it in the church my daughter attends. It had a pair of sound columns mounted on each side of the massive stage, the subs (2) were positioned beneath the stage on each side, the choir was about 30 people, the preachers (2) were using Countryman 6 mics, and the choir members were all singing through SM57 beta mics. The piano and organ were miked as well and the overall sound was beyond anything you could imagine. I would suggest that you contact Bose personally, talk with their engineers and they will likely send an sound engineer to your church to look over the venue in detail. I don't know what the cost was, but I'm confident is was under the $10,000 budget you set aside for the project.

Good Luck,

Gary

Peavey does have a church line...the main line stuff in prettier packaging at about twice the regular price.

The thing about Peavey...it's built like it could withstand WW 111.

Church sound consultants are, sadly, sometime pretty unethical, exploiting the lack of knowledge on the part of the "committee"
appointed to purchase/choose equipment. That's probably not the case here.

The stuff you choose needs to be rock solid, performance-wise, easy to operate and you need to get it at 35-40% off of list price.

Russ

Things go wrong on church stages! Trust me, I've been there for plenty of it...

A mixer that the un-technical can quickly fix an overloaded input on, a mis-connected mike, a drum mike that got moved, a choir mike that ends up facing the wrong direction, a guitarist that suddenly decides that the Spirit is calling him to play four times louder than rehearsal... That's what you need!

Presets aren't what you need in a live situation. We often forget, because of our familiarity with electronic gear, that many others AREN'T. And it's no good being on stage when the mixer is at the back of the chapel! The guy behind the board can make or break you. Complicating his task with a digital board can come back to bite you. There are thousands of guys you can get to work an analog board, but those with extensive experience on digital boards are fewer. And those familiar with the particular board you pick even fewer than that.

Unless your church has the budget for a fulltime, reliable qualified digital soundman, try to pick your equipment based on the LEAST qualified guy you might ever find yourself using!

One of the largest churches in my area is using a pair of Bose L1...not sure what they use for a mixer, but I understand it is an exceptionally efficient and great sounding system.

No feedback issues, and superb sound distribution.

Ian

Yes I think a pair of Bose L1 is by far the best choice for a church, especially when there is unlikely to be a dedicated audio engineer. I think any reputable mixer will work well with that system. A conventional system is much more likely to have disturbing feedback issues which is the last thing you want to have to deal with during a church service with no-one sitting at the mixer. As Diki points out there are many problems that can occur on a church stage.

Plus a pair of Bose L1 and a good mixing board comes in way under $10,000 so allows for other necessary extras like quality microphones and stands which could add up if a number of mics are required.

I can only speak from my own experience and as the Verger of our own church here in the UK I oversee all the functions wedding,funeral,public and concerts. Our church has fantastic accustics as most of the old churches do and like most it was built somwhere around 1200 AD of stone and timber of course with mods down the ages . We just have a simple public address system of 60 watts (with wireless loop for the hearing impaired) this carries wireless mic's for speech and sometimes solo vocalists. The system also caters for output CD playing if needed. Our organ is accustic pipe and the only instruments that ever require a mic are accustic guitars. This system is quite adequate for us but of course not necessarily so for all others or different situations.